Royal (ish) news. Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex – who according to some placed Prince Harry under a dark enchantment in the wicked kingdom of Montecito, California – is to make an acting comeback.
She will appear in the forthcoming film, Close Personal Friends, alongside Lily Collins and Brie Larson, reportedly playing herself. An intriguing move. Markle hasn’t acted since her 2018 nuptials. It’s as if she felt she truly belonged with the likes of former first lady, Michelle Obama, breathing the rarefied air of the TED-talking alpha-fast-track philanthropy circuit.
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Instead, Markle ended up cooing over homemade strawberry jam in her lifestyle show, With Love, Meghan, as part of the couple’s initial kazillion-dollar Netflix deal (since “adjusted”). It’s astonishing how much drear the Sussexes churned out … but zilch acting. As someone who watched Suits – and therefore Meghan BH (Before Harry) – she was fine at it.
Cue cynics to point out that Markle never stopped acting (being regal is her greatest role). But then, however much she might invite or even enjoy the scrutiny, it would be forced upon her regardless. There must be fewer more exhausting "roles" than “Meghan Markle, Duchess Of Sussex”. It continues to be ironic that Meghan might end up acting less – in fewer demanding scenes, with less challenging plot-twists – if she picked up a script and went back to the fictionalised kind of drama.
I’ve become convinced that there is such a thing as red carpet reputational rehab, leastways in the fevered minds of entertainment marketing teams.
Actors David Harbour and Millie Bobby Brown have been observed hugging and gushing over each other at the recent premiere at the TCL Chinese theatre, in Hollywood for the imminent fifth and final series of the hit Netflix show, Stranger Things.
Strange, indeed. Harbour was rumoured to be exempt from promotional duties after the furore surroundingthe recent eviscerating pop release from his ex Lily Allen, West End Girl. On the acclaimed album, she sings of a twisted open marriage, the discovery of a secret stash of sex toys and being cheated on multiple times. It might be helpful to think of Lily’s opus as the British-based Vimto to Beyonce’s Lemonade.
Elsewhere, it’s been reported that Brown filed a (non-sexual) “harassment and bullying claim” against Harbour before the final series commenced filming.
Yet here Harbour and Brown are. Far be it for the rest of us to speculate, but does one hear the crack of a PR whip in the background? Global brand protection is a wonderful – and healing – thing.
More actors. Brian Cox recently spoke of being “irritated” by method acting. He encountered the thespian technique, which was made popular by the Actor’s Studio in New York, with Jeremy Strong on the set of Succession, who he feels was influenced by Daniel Day-Lewis. Now Day-Lewis has responded to what he terms a “handbags at dawn conflict” with Cox. Day-Lewis feels that those who've “gobbed off” about the technique usually fail to understand it.
A famous story about The Method concerns Laurence Olivier. On the set of the 1976 film, Marathon Man, observing Dustin Hoffman sweating and panting himself into character, Olivier is supposed to have said wearily: “My dear boy, why don’t you just try acting?”
Despite both Day-Lewis and Cox being British, could there be a UK/US divide? Does The Method continue to be adhered to almost as the American answer to Shakespeare? Wherever you stand on The Method, it’s striking how plainly and honestly both Day-Lewis and Cox are speaking. A small but refreshing rebellion in these airless PR-controlled times.
Photograph by Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Time